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The key to predicting the performance of hockey teams is figuring out their “true talent,” which is easier said than done. In baseball, numerous people make reasonable projections of playing time for each player on every team, along with predicting offensive and defensive contributions. With these projections, an expected level of performance for each team can be estimated. We’re not there in hockey – all we have to go on is a team’s actual performance; in particular, its expected winning percentage based on goals scored and allowed during regulation play. We can make adjustments to this winning percentage if the team faced a tough schedule or if it made significant trade deadline acquisitions or had star players returning from or lost to injuries. However, for the vast majority of teams –including the field this season – estimated “true talent” and actual performance are within a few percentage points of each other.
How do I project playoff winning percentages? First, I look to what’s known as the “Pythagorean” equation for winning percentage:
Wpct = (GF^2)/((GF^2) + (GA^2))
This turns out to be a better predictor of a team’s future winning percentage against average competition than actual winning percentage.
We then need to know how a team will fare against a given opponent. We start with Bill James’ equation for single-game head-to-head winning percentage.
WpctAvsB = (WpctA - (WpctA * WpctB))/((WpctA + WpctB) - (2*WpctA*WpctB))
For example, in one first-round match-up, Detroit has an expected winning percentage against an average team of 0.599, while Columbus’ is 0.489. Overall, this puts Detroit’s winning percentage for each individual playoff game at 61%. To figure out the likelihood or odds of Detroit winning a seven-game series, I’ll stay away from factorials and just count out the number of possible outcomes:
4Games 5Games 6Games 7Games
1 WWWW LWWWW LLWWWW LLLWWWW WLLLWWW
2 WLWWW LWLWWW LLWLWWW WLLWLWW
3 WWLWW LWWLWW LLWWLWW WLLWWLW
4 WWWLW LWWWLW LLWWWLW WLWLLWW
5 WLLWWW LWLLWWW WLWLWLW
6 WLWLWW LWLWLWW WLWWLLW
7 WLWWLW LWLWWLW WWLLLWW
8 WWLLWW LWWLLWW WWLLWLW
9 WWLWLW LWWLWLW WWLWLLW
10 WWWLLW LWWWLLW WWWLLLW
Odds 13.8% 21.6% 21.1% 16.4%
Total
Probability 13.8% + 21.6% + 21.1% + 16.4% = 72.9%
Overall, Detroit has a 72.9% chance of winning the series against Columbus.
Counting out all of these outcomes is very tedious, so I ran the numbers through 10,000 simulated playoff runs and came up with the following outcomes:
Eastern Conference – 1st Round
Home Wpct Away Wpct Likely Winner Wpct
BOS 0.673 MTL 0.504 BOS 83.1%
WAS 0.550 NYR 0.470 WAS 66.9%
NJ 0.557 CAR 0.522 NJ 58.4%
PIT 0.546 PHI 0.556 PHI 51.3%
Western Conference – 1st Round
Home Wpct Away Wpct Likely Winner Wpct
SJ 0.623 ANA 0.504 SJ 74.9%
DET 0.599 COL 0.489 DET 72.5%
VCR 0.562 STL 0.500 VCR 63.4%
CHI 0.608 CAL 0.512 CHI 70.3%
The West looks fairly lopsided in the direction of the favorites, while the East has two close match-ups – or three, if you think Sean Avery and Nik Antropov have made the Rangers a substantially better team.
One interesting thing to note is Boston’s 2nd round draw compared to Washington’s. Not only is Boston a much better team than Washington, they also expect to get a much worse opponent in the second round, giving Boston an 81% chance to win their 2nd round series, while Washington is barely 50-50 to come out of theirs.
Opp Opp Wpct BOS Opp % WAS Opp %
NJD 0.557 0.0 48.4
PIT 0.546 18.4 16.7
PHI 0.556 20.3 18.0
CAR 0.522 27.9 0.0
NYR 0.470 33.5 0.0
MTL 0.504 0.0 16.8
AVG Oppt Wpct 0.516 0.546
Series Wpct 0.814 0.509
Here we see each team’s likelihood of making it through each round. Boston is by far the favorite, winning 83% of its first round series and making it to the finals almost 51% of the time. Boston is also, not surprisingly, the most likely to win the Stanley Cup.
Team 1st 2nd 3rd Cup
BOS 83.2 67.0 50.6 34.0
SJ 75.0 51.7 30.6 15.8
CHI 70.3 39.0 22.3 11.4
DET 73.1 44.6 22.3 11.0
VCR 64.0 28.6 12.1 4.7
WAS 66.5 33.4 11.3 4.6
NJ 58.4 30.8 11.2 4.5
PHI 51.9 22.6 9.4 3.9
PIT 48.1 20.6 7.8 3.1
CAR 41.7 13.0 4.7 1.7
MTL 16.8 6.9 3.1 1.2
CGY 29.7 10.8 3.7 1.1
STL 36.0 10.5 3.6 1.1
ANA 25.1 7.6 2.9 0.7
COL 26.9 7.3 2.6 0.7
NYR 33.5 5.6 2.0 0.6
Who will we see in the finals? Lots of Bruins and lots of top seeds: a bottom four seed from either conference snuck through less than 30% of the time, and only one out of every 40 simulated finals featured two bottom half teams.
East West Pct of Time
BOS SJ 15.0
BOS DET 11.4
BOS CHI 11.3
BOS VCR 6.3
NJ SJ 3.7
WAS SJ 3.6
PHI SJ 3.1
WAS CHI 2.6
NJ CHI 2.5
WAS DET 2.4
What’s the bottom line? The East has only one really good team, while the West has three “merely” good ones. The Bruins are as likely to win the Cup as San Jose, Detroit and Chicago combined. What about first-time playoff team Columbus? They have a 1 in 40 shot to make the finals with a 1 in 4 chance to win the cup, once they get there.
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